Review #4: Takenoko

# of Players: 2-4
Playtime: 1-2 Hours

Core Mechanic: Action Selection/Tile Placement

Theme: Gardening
Type: Family Euro

Weight: Light-Medium

Year: 2011

Rating: 7*

Takenoko to me feels like the gateway jack-of-all trades. First, it has a cutesy theme that really helps to draw new gamers in - who doesn't want to control a bamboo-loving panda? Second, it introduces a wide variety game concepts in an easily digestible package - a bit of action selection, tile laying, secret objective - making it a good stepping stone to more complicated games later on. Third, there is a fair bit of interaction and can become a bit cutthroat at times, making it a bit more appealing who don't like the solitaire feel some other euro games emanate. Fifth, pandas - pandas, pandas, pandas.

The winner of the game will be the player who scores the most victory points by completing secret objectives. The end game is triggered when one player completes the required number of objectives for the game, which varies depending on player count. Objectives come in three different categories - plots, panda, and gardener. Plot objectives need tiles to match to configuration on the card, gardener objectives need bamboo grown on the tile to match the card, and panda objectives need bamboo eaten by the panda and collected in your personal supply to match the card. Yes, you will be moving around a panda and chomping on bamboo.

Gameplay is very straightforward - players take turns one after another until the end game is reached. Each turn, you first roll a weather die which provides a turn bonus such as extra actions or an improvement. Then you will take two different actions in a row. The plot action allows you to place a tile while the irrigation action allows you to take an irrigation channel which you can use at any time to water tiles too far from the central pond, since bamboo needs water to grow. The garderner action lets you move the gardener to grow bamboo and the panda action lets you move the panda to eat bamboo. Finally, the objective action allows you to draw a new objective card, of which you can only have five at a time.

The game length is pretty short and the end can come about quite fast, especially if players are holding back their completed objectives to try to catch others off guard. There is a lot of interaction as well as players will have competing goals. For example, one player may have a gardener objective to grow green bamboo while another may have a panda objective to eat green bamboo. Other players may put down a tile that completely screws up with your plot objective plans. It is quite easy sometimes to get an idea of what objectives everyone is aiming for and to foil each other's plans. Thanks to the theme, these confrontational moments do not feel as harsh as they would in another game, but underneath you get a feel for its cutthroat nature.

As I mentioned before, this feels like the gateway jack-of-all-trades. It ranks very highly on BoardGameGeek just outside the Top 200 Games of All-Time and even has a renowned designer behind it, Antoine Bauza, who is probably most famous for 7 Wonders but has also published other well-received games such as Hanabi and Tokaido. But for me, this game is losing its luster the more I play it and, although maybe it is just because I am just terrible at the game, I think there are many other gateway games I would rather play. However, for many it would make a great game to add to the Gateway collection - I just wouldn't call it essential. For people who love Takenoko, there is a maddeningly expensive but gorgeous Collector's Edition.